The patent describes a manufacturing process whereby glass pieces can be fused together and subsequently machined. This isn't solely to create seamless monolithic objects, as the company envisions creating raised glass protrusions to break up the surface at points. In addition, they're even talking about adding internal support ribs, taking a page from plastics' book. Here are some of the relevant points:

A rounded edge feature may be formed by machining the thickened edge.

Raised fused glass features may surround openings in the planar glass member.

Multiple planar glass members may be fused together to form a five-sided box in which electronic components may be mounted.

Raised support structure ribs may be formed by fusing glass structures to a planar glass member.

Opaque masking material and colored glass may be used to create portions of the glass housing structures that hide internal device components from view.

Without reading the patents in detail, I would not be surprised if these are intended to be used for fusing Liquidmetal, an alloy that is very similar to glass.
Also, it would be very interesting to see how a Liquidmetal chassis holds up in drop and abrasion testing compared to Apple's usual Aluminum Chassis.

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